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Synriam, Ranbaxy’s new anti-malarial drug combination, is the first new drug R&D project by an Indian generics company that’s yielded a marketable drug. That’s big in itself as various media reports have acknowledged.

To me, its key value lies not so much in its “firstness.” Its value is even greater as a case study – with one or more Indian entities at the centre – that holds multiple lessons on the nature of R&D, on the value of partnerships, on the role of governments, on the need for a competitive and heterogenous drug industry where everybody doesn’t think like everybody else. And so on.

Am sure that there are other drugs that’ve hit the market globally that can illustrate some of this even better but this is a story that India can own given that it’s played such a pivotal role in it. Continue reading →